Re: Planned changes to the VIAF RDF

In message <BANLkTinY6HZ2Fy1niUauNb2Ws6F4KLBykQ@mail.gmail.com>, Ross 
Singer <ross.singer@talis.com> writes
>On Wed, Apr 13, 2011 at 10:49 AM, Karen Coyle <kcoyle@kcoyle.net>
>wrote:
>  I can see this becoming unwieldy, however.
>   
>  person_123_who_was_walking_along_Main_Street_on_Saturday_July_7_2011
>
>  It seems that there's a noun-verb struggle here. The person is the same
>  person, the activity is different. I know that some of these distinctions
>  are bound into our subject headings, but rather than change the identity
>  of the person I would prefer that we use the name in a context where
>  possible.
>
>  George Bush --> served as POTUS --> dates
>  George Bush --> author of --> autobiog
>
>  It's the same person, but the activity of the person has changed, not
>  his identity.
>
>But as a subject, these make a bit of a difference (and, realistically, is
>where narrower terms come in) and you'd (potentially) want to be able to
>distinguish between them.
>
>A book written about the executive branch of the United States in the first
>decade of the 21st century probably should generate a significantly
>different graph than book about the ownership of the Texas Rangers
>(although there is, of course, one notable overlap).
>
>If the subject is significant (and distinct) enough, we should be able to
>specify it.  You're absolutely right, though, there is a limit to what's
>practical.

Isn't this just the classic pre- vs. post-coordinate indexing debate in 
another guise? In a Linked Data context, I suspect that you get much 
more utility (in the sense that you can answer a much wider range of 
queries from a single set of assertions) from analysing out in the way 
Karen suggests.

Richard

-- 
Richard Light

Received on Wednesday, 13 April 2011 15:27:04 UTC